Windows 7 is not an interface that lends itself to touch, so it's with a degree of surprise and a healthy dose of relief to say that the new Samsung 7 Series Slate PC is a bit tasty.
Despite the name, this is very much a tablet and it couldn't be more different to the monstrous Asus Eee Slate EP121 or the lacklustre Acer Iconia Tab W500 that we looked at earlier in the year.
Indeed, it looks a lot more like its Galaxy Tab stablemates than any of its - let's call them 'bulky' - Windows 7 tablet rivals. Despite packing an 11.6-inch screen and a quad-core Intel Core i5-2467M CPU, this tablet is slim and light and without doubt the best Windows tablet we've seen.
How Samsung has managed to pack so much power into such a slender chassis is a mystery, but if Windows 7 ever had a chance of being a hit on tablets, the Samsung Series 7 Slate PC is the device to try it on.
The screen is lovely, colours are vivid, brightness is great and it's responsive too.
Of course, the old problems are still there. The fingers we used to try out the Slate are not exactly fat, but it's still a bit tricky to land a clean screen press on the smaller Windows buttons.
This is a problem that will not go away until Windows 8 finally makes berth next year. But even so, in the time we spent with it, we didn't find ourselves getting frustrated with the Series 7 Slate PC which is a first for us.
It's not too heavy, either, at 890g (admittedly that's a chunk heavier than the Galaxy Tab 10.1) so it's a heck of a lot more portable than the 12-inch Asus, while the chassis has a smooth, premium feel that only adds to the experience.
Clearly this tablet is not going to sell in the same volume as the Galaxy Tab range (Apple patent permitting), but if a Windows tablet is a must for you, you should come back once Samsung has sent us a full review sample, because this is probably as good as Windows 7 tablets are ever going to get.
